


I Would Love to Love You

by whateverrrrwhatever



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: All The Tropes, Alpha Derek Hale, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, BAMF Stiles Stilinski, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Minor Original Character(s), Romance, Smut, Sterek Secret Santa, There's Lots of Running in the Woods, There’s a flower crown too, Vernon Boyd & Erica Reyes Live, Werewolf Courting, Werewolf Culture, Werewolf Mates, Werewolf Politics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-15
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:07:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21802666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whateverrrrwhatever/pseuds/whateverrrrwhatever
Summary: Stiles and Erica drive out to a gathering of werewolves on a mission to befriend a neighboring pack. Stiles stumbles into an entirely different kind of connection.“Wait, you’re serious?” Stiles asks. “Everyone else is here to get werewolf engaged? We thought -- I mean, we’re here to form alliances.”Cora blinks at him. “Duh. How do you think alliances are formed?”
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 46
Kudos: 970
Collections: The Sterek Secret Santa - Edition 2019





	I Would Love to Love You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheyDraggedMeInNowIAintLeaving](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheyDraggedMeInNowIAintLeaving/gifts).



> Infinite thanks to [dottie_wan_kenobi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dottie_wan_kenobi) for being an amazing beta reader and writing pal!
> 
> For [TheyDraggedMeInNowIAintLeaving](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theydraggedmeinnowiaintleaving). Thanks for the amazing prompt! You asked for so many of my favorite things I had a hard time choosing and ended up with this. I hope you like it!

According to Scott, or more accurately, Scott’s sources, the gathering is in Colorado this year, on pack land high in the Rockies. It takes Erica and Stiles three hours on the highway from Denver and another forty minutes of winter-worn winding country roads to get to the Miles pack’s cabin, queasily diving in and out of cell reception the whole way.

By the time they arrive, Stiles has a cramp in his calf and he’s regretting the red vines he insisted on buying on their way out of the city, but the mountain air is crisp and fantastic. They’d spent the last leg of the drive with the windows down and the heat turned up, car flooded with the scent of pine forest. Erica hadn’t even complained about her hair once.

“Well, well,” she says, stepping around the car to stand next to Stiles and stare up at the lodge in front of them. “It looks like cabin was a bit of an understatement.”

“Yeah,” Stiles agrees, grabbing his duffel and laying a hand on the doorplate. “You wanna?”

“Always,” she grins, and they walk in together.

They step straight from the drive into a room of plush carpets and overstuffed leather couches. The fireplaces at each end of the room are large enough for Stiles to stand in, carved out of pale, mottled marble. Across from them, wide doors open onto a sweeping wooden deck.

“Hmm,” Erica runs her hand along the back of a tufted silver velvet armchair, raising an eyebrow. “How lush.”

“If you say so,” Stiles says, but she’s right. There’s a lambskin tossed over the chair’s matching ottoman. A pair of moose antlers adorn each fireplace, garlands winding around candelabra where they’re draped across the carved mantelpieces. He hikes his duffel bag high on his shoulder and stands up straight. “You ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” Erica sighs, and together, they step out onto the deck.

An open meadow ringed with cabins and canvas tents stretches before them. Wood smoke drifts over the heads of the werewolves gathered on the grass. A dozen of them, half-shifted, chase each other in and out of the pines where the meadow bleeds into dense woods at its edges, mountains dwarfing the treetops in the distance. Stiles takes a deep breath in, tasting the smoke and the mountain air. 

He’d known the gathering was a big deal but this is beyond anything he imagined. He’s never seen this many wolves in one place before, never more than the ones in his own pack, and Satomi’s. But here, there are hundreds: laughing, arguing, milling around the firepit at the center of the meadow. The atmosphere in the space is sharp and heady, anticipatory.

“I’ve never been to a werewolf summit before, but this definitely looks like one,” Erica says quietly. She’s scanning the crowd, nostrils flaring, shifting her weight to stand slightly in front of Stiles.

He rests a hand on her arm, squeezing lightly. “Yep, sure does. What do you say we find our cabin and get settled in? Then we can get started on making friends and trying to get an introduction to the Joergers.”

“Good idea,” she nods, the tension in her shoulders easing slightly. If Stiles is overwhelmed by the sheer number and noise of the werewolves at the gathering, he can’t imagine how she feels. “Let’s do that.”

“Don’t leave yet,” a young man calls from behind them, stepping out of the lodge. “They’re about to announce the first challenge.”

He’s tall and thin, and followed by a girl with brown hair all the way down to her waist. She’s carrying a pile of snacks that she abandons on a chair on her way to them.

“The first challenge?” Stiles turns toward him, raising an eyebrow.

“Yes.” He glances between their blank looks. “I take it you haven’t attended a gathering before.”

“Nope,” Erica says. “So why don’t you explain it to us?”

“Oh, he will,” the girl snorts, ripping open a bag.

“The challenges are a way to show everyone how valuable you’d be as an ally or packmate,” he says, gesturing toward the field. “The participants are assigned a team and sent into the woods to try to steal a talisman from the other teams while defending their own. The last team standing wins. There’s a points system for the players, too, so everyone can—”

“Wait,” Stiles interrupts. “To demonstrate our physical fitness, strategic thinking, and ability to work on a team we’re going to play _capture the flag_?”

“No — no, it’s not capture the flag,” he protests, flustered. “It’s a traditional territorial defense competition.”

“It’s capture the flag,” the girl next to them confirms, crunching on a pork rind.

“Got it,” Stiles nods slowly. He learned a great many things in his thirteen years attending summer day camp before everything in his life reoriented to revolve around supernatural beings and ley lines and the Nemeton. How to absolutely kick ass at capture the flag was chief among them.

Spending the past five summers turning his spark of magic into a full-fledged flame probably hasn’t hurt his chances any, either.

“It’s not,” the kid insists, but before he can continue, the clanging of a giant bell echoes through the meadow, and as it gets louder and louder a chorus of excited, joyful howls rises up from the meadow in response.

“Werewolves,” Stiles sighs.

++

They’re at the gathering to forge alliances, not to win werewolf capture the flag, but Stiles does anyway, with the help of a small glamor or two to render him silent and scentless as he scrambles through the undergrowth in search of the other team’s talisman.

They aren’t very organized — they’ve only left one person to guard the wooden disk that they’ve tucked in the hollow of a burnt-out tree, and as soon as he’s chasing off after another werewolf, snarling in warning, Stiles slips out of his hiding spot and snags his prize.

“Like taking candy from a baby,” he laughs to himself — what, like he’s going to miss the opportunity for a classic line like that? — flipping the talisman over his knuckles as he goes to slip back into the trees, when he nearly runs headfirst into an incredibly naked muscled torso.

He looks up. The torso belongs to one alpha werewolf, shirtless and surprised. The blue band on his wrist tells Stiles they’re playing on the same team. “You got it?”

“Yep. And I’ll be the one to bring it back,” Stiles challenges. Every hair on the back of his neck is standing up, even though he’s not scared in the slightest — in fact, this guy is way hotter than he is scary, standing there barefoot in the middle of winter with leaves in his messy dark hair, smears of dirt on his arms, along his stubbled jaw. No, this is more like a static charge running up his spine, prickling along the small of his back, warming his cheeks. He shakes it off.

“In that case,” the werewolf says, holding his hands up and taking a step back. “Don’t let me stop you.” He pauses for a long moment, looking at Stiles. The corner of his mouth quirks up in an almost smile, and then he’s gone — turning and running back into the woods, but not before Stiles gets a one last look at him and the giant spiraled tattoo between his shoulder blades.

“Thanks, big guy,” Stiles mutters under his breath, shoving the talisman in his pocket and ducking back into the undergrowth. “But you couldn’t even if you tried.” 

++

“Look! I made the leaderboard at the werewolf summit!” Stiles crows over dinner later, kicking Erica under the table and pointing at the wall with his fork.

“Fantastic,” Erica drawls. “You’re camper of the week. But can we actually do what we came here to do? Maybe we can even go home early.”

“Right,” Stiles says, spearing a chunk of carrot and settling in. “William Joerger is supposed to be here, but I haven’t seen him yet.”

Stiles knows this is hard on her — she’s gotten so much better at control in the years since she’s been bitten, but it was a long road for all of them after the rogue alpha tore through town and left a trail of newly-bitten teenage werewolves in his wake. New situations like this tend to still be difficult, even without hundreds of other werewolves in the vicinity.

“I miss Boyd,” Erica says, pouting as she picks at the venison on her plate. “How badly do we need an alliance with the Joergers, anyway?”

Stiles sighs. his isn’t the first time they’ve had this argument and he’s getting tired of it. “Technically, we can live without it. But if we can make a connection with them, we can make a connection with dozens of other older packs that are more traditional and reclusive and can tell us more about the Nemeton. They’re our neighbors and our best bet.”

“I still say we should have just driven up to Truckee and talked to them face-to-face. We could be skiing right now.” 

“You know they’re too traditional for that. Another pack wandering onto their territory without a formal invitation? We’d be dead before we made it halfway up the mountain.” Stiles swipes a crust of bread through the sauce on his plate. “Without an introduction, we’re screwed.”

“And now we’re here,” Erica points out. “Playing werewolf capture the flag and eating in a giant dining hall with wolves from dozens of packs in Bumfuck, Colorado.”

“Winning at werewolf capture the flag,” Stiles corrects her, pointing at the leaderboard once more. “Winning.”

++

Stiles should be thinking about finding William Joerger, but instead he’s thinking about the werewolf in the woods when he leaves breakfast the next morning. Why didn’t he try to take the token from Stiles? What was it about him that made Stiles feel like he had touched a live wire? What color even were his eyes, anyway? Maybe that’s why he smashes full-tilt into the girl from the day before as she’s coming around the corner to the dining hall and lands on his ass on the strip of parquet flooring between the rug and the door.

“Hey, grace.” The girl offers a hand to help him up. “You might want to watch where you’re going.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Stiles groans. “Thanks for that. I’m sure this had nothing to do with the way you came around that corner at full speed.”

“Definitely not,” she grins. “How did capture the flag work out for you yesterday?”

“Not too bad.” Recovered, Stiles points at the board on the wall. “That’s me. Stiles Stilinski, McCall pack, from California.”

“Nice,” she says. “I’m Cora Hale, from the Hale Pack. Our territory’s in the Hudson River Valley.”

“So Cora, let me ask you something.” Stiles glances around — except for them, the lodge is blessedly empty — and lowering his voice. “Is it just me or is this whole thing —” he waves a hand toward the meadow, “— slightly weird and totally absurd?”

“You’re not wrong,” she says. “On either count. It’s kind of like… summer camp.”

“It’s a little…odd. That they do this every year.” 

“It’s ridiculous,” she agrees. “And old-fashioned, and upholds stupid pack hierarchies. But my brother is a pathetically stunted hopeless romantic and totally clueless, so here I am.”

“He sounds like a real catch,” Stile says dryly.

“Yeah, well,” she sighs, shrugging. “He’s not so bad most of the time but something about the possibility of true mates makes him all… weird.”

“What? _Mates_?”

“Well, yeah. That’s the whole point of this entire gathering thing — or, that’s how it got started, anyway. Packs used to send their betas to try and find their true mates. Make an offer of courtship, see if a bond flares, walk away married. Now,” she shrugs and gestures around them, the wolves clustered in front of the fire, walking down the hall, two young betas talking quietly in a dark corner. “In theory, they’re here to find mates. In practice, they’re here to find someone to date, maybe formally court. Give the traditional gifts. Definitely to get laid by the end of the weekend.”

“Wait, you’re serious?” Stiles asks. “Everyone else is here to get werewolf engaged? We thought — I mean, we’re here to form alliances.”

Cora blinks at him. “Duh. How do you think alliances are formed?”

“I don’t know!” Stiles gestures furiously. “Introductions. Negotiations. Treaties. Ceremonial gifts for allies. Not true mates and courtship and whatever this is!”

“I mean, you’re not wrong. But the oldest and easiest way back in the day was this. Gather over the Wolf Moon, compete in a bunch of stupid games, find someone to bone down, and leave with new packmates and allies. It’s tradition,” Cora shrugs.

“So instead of meeting potential allies and strengthening my pack, I’m spending the weekend at a werewolf singles’ sleepaway camp,” Stiles says flatly.

“It’s more like—” Cora starts to answer, but her voice is drowned out by a sudden chorus of howls rising up from the meadow outside. It sounds like every werewolf in the meadow is joining in as it grows louder and louder, finally coming to an abrupt silence.

“What the hell was that?” Stiles asks, blinking.

“It’s the hunt,” Cora says, and they step outside, just in time to avoid the rush of stragglers hurrying from the dining room out to the meadow.

“What’s the hunt?” Erica asks from behind them. At least someone is focused on the task at hand — Stiles keeps getting distracted by the crowd. There’s what must be a courtship presentation happening behind them, a tall, blond wolf kneeling and pulling an ornately carved wooden box from inside his jacket and opening it to reveal a fine gold necklace studded with rubies. Stiles stares, transfixed.

“This is the stupidest idea we’ve ever had,” he blurts out. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m even doing here.”

Erica laughs at him.“Right now you’re going to go on the hunt, whatever that means. Don’t forget about Joerger.” She pats him on the back. “We’ll figure the rest out when you get back.”

+++

Stiles finally finds Joerger beside a frozen pond, although ‘finds’ is a generous term: Joerger has Stiles cornered, pushed up against a tree trunk, a clawed hand fisted in the lapel of his jacket.

“Hand over your token, honey. I don’t want to have to hurt you.” Joerger leers and snaps his teeth. “Pretty little human like you has to be careful… accidents can happen when you play with wild animals.”

“I don’t think so,” Stiles says. This dude is… something else. “I’m gonna go ahead and keep my token, and pretend you didn’t say that last part. In fact, consider this your chance to take that back.”

The wolf barks out a laugh. “Nice try, human. You’re all alone out here. There’s no one for miles.”

“That’s too bad. I’d really like for someone to hear you beg me to let you go.” Stiles flexes and stretches his fingers, feeling around in the earth for the trees surrounding him. They shudder at the contact, branches rustling, sending a shower of leaves drifting down into the clearing.

“You — you’re the spark,” the wolf says, and lets him go, stumbling backward, eyes wide. “From that mutt pack in Beacon Hills.”

“Yep,” Stiles grins and sends roots shooting up out of the forest floor to twine around the wolf’s shoulders, yanking him down to the ground. He howls in frustration, trying to pull free, but the roots have grown over his arms, tangled around his ankles, woven around his waist. Stiles walks over, ignoring William’s low growl, and slips his fingers into the wolf’s pocket. They don’t need an alliance with the Joerger pack badly enough to put up with creepy predators and speciesist assholes like this guy.

“Thanks for these,” Stiles says, counting the tokens. There are seven gleaming silver pieces cupped in his palm. He pockets the coins and stands, headed deeper into the woods. “See you around.”

“Wait! You can't just leave me here!” William shouts after him.

“Oh, but I am,” Stiles calls back. That asshole can find his own way out.

++

Four rootbound werewolves and a handful of tokens later, Stiles climbs onto a granite shelf behind a towering juniper bush — the scent should keep everyone away while he rests — and stumbles into the alpha from the day before.

“It’s you,” Stiles says. His arms break out in goosebumps and his skin feels charged with static.

“And you,” the werewolf agrees. At least he’s wearing a shirt this time — though it’s a henley with thumbholes of all things — but he’s just as barefoot as he was the day before. The alpha gives him an evaluating look. “You wouldn’t have anything to do with the werewolves I’ve been found tied up in tree roots and vines, would you?”

“No idea what you’re talking about,” Stiles says, shaking his head. “And I’m absolutely sure that whoever did this had very good reasons and every one of them earned it.”

“That’s some impressive magic. Whoever did it must be pretty powerful.”

“It’s nothing special,” Stiles shrugs, and tries to shake the weird tense feeling out of his shoulders. “Amateur stuff, really.”

“I guess you’d know. You’re doing pretty well, according to the leaderboard. Amazing, for a human.” The werewolf grins a little, like werewolves do: crooked, predatory, a few too many teeth. For some reason, it doesn’t put Stiles on edge when this guy does it. Maybe because he looks impressed, not hungry. “I’m Derek. You were talking to my sister back at the lodge.”

“Stiles. From the McCall pack in California.” He looks up at Derek. He’s standing very, very close — they never really moved apart after bumping into each other — and looking down at Stiles. It’s intense, like an electric current running through Stiles from head to toe. He wants it to stop, and he doesn’t. “Aren’t you going to try to take my tokens?”

“Like you said before,” Derek says. “I don’t think I could if I tried.” He raises his eyebrows and turns to jump down to the forest floor.

“You’re not wrong,” Stiles says, grinning, watching him go. A strange, unbidden thought bubbles up in the back of his mind: he wants Derek to stay.

“I’d say good luck,” Derek says as he walks away. “But I don’t think you need any.” With that, he takes off running into the woods, and he’s gone.

++

“According to Cora, we were supposed to bring courtship gifts to this shindig,” Stiles tells Erica over breakfast the next morning, slicing into a baked apple half. “Specifically, a crown, a book, and a knife. Apparently big game was a traditional gift way back in the day, but everyone got tired of washing blood out of their clothes and the carpets.” Stiles watches a tall, dark-haired were unwrap a circlet from a fine cloth and present the token in her pale hands. The woman before her smiles slightly and nods, lowering her head to accept the gift — it’s a thin, gilt crown laden with tiny nests and songbirds, pearl eggs nestled in each one. It’s stunning.

“We’ve got one of those,” Erica offers. Stiles nods, thinking back to the illuminated medieval bestiary tucked into their luggage back in the cabin. “Good thing we’re not actually here to court anyone.”

“Yeah, good thing.” Stiles agrees, clearing his throat. “So hey, have you met Cora’s brother?”

“The pathetic one? No,” Erica sips her coffee. “Why?” 

“No reason,” Stiles says. “We were on the same team in capture the flag. And I ran into him yesterday, during the hunt.” He pokes at his eggs. “He’s… intriguing.”

“Aww,” Erica grins over her mug. “Does somebody have a little crush?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. I don’t know him or anything. But, probably, yes. If having a little crush means he sends chills down my spine and I have the uncontrollable urge to fuck him until he cries and spend the rest of the night cuddling, staring into each others’ eyes and naming our future children. Is that too much, do you think?”

“Yes,” Erica says without hesitation. “Definitely. But too much is kind of your brand.”

Stiles laughs, groaning, and rests his forehead on the table. She’s not wrong.

Erica finishes her breakfast, but Stiles goes back for seconds. When he makes it back to his seat with a plate full of apple crisp, Cora’s there, biting into a slice of bacon.

“Good morning,” she says, raising an eyebrow. “I hear you’ve met my brother.”

“Yep,” he says. “Sure have.” He’s not sure where this conversation is going, and what’s more, he’s not sure he wants to find out. A shiver runs across his shoulders, remembering the weird, electric buzzing he’d felt with Derek in the woods the day before.

“Erica said your pack is from Beacon Hills.” Something about the way she says it isn’t quite friendly.

“That’s right.”

“Interesting. We’re from Beacon Hills, too.” And suddenly, Stiles’s brain makes the connection — the _Hale_ family, burned to death in a house fire deep in the preserve, his dad coming home during breakfast, smelling of acrid smoke, tired and sad.

“Oh my god. You’re—” 

“There’s something you should know,” Cora ignores him, barrelling onward. “About true mates. They’re rare. Rare enough that some people think they’re a myth. But the connection between them is strongest at the height of the full moon.”

“Okay,” Stiles says slowly. “What does that have to do—”

“I haven’t experienced it, but other people in my family have. Or did,” Cora reaches for another slice of bacon. “They said it was like an electric current running through their bones. A ringing in their ears, or a weird humming feeling in their ribcage. Different for all of them, a little unpleasant. But compelling. That’s what a true mate feels like when you meet them.”

“Oh,” Stiles says, heart skipping in his chest. He can barely manage to swallow. He doesn’t know what to say or think, can’t quite wrap his head around what all of this means, doesn’t know how to believe it. “But I’m not a werewolf.”

“Doesn’t matter. You’re pack,” Cora says, tossing her napkin on her plate and pushing away from the table. “Come on. It’s almost time for werewolf red rover.”

++

Stiles can’t sleep that night. He washes his face and brushes his teeth, changing into pajamas and siding into bed, but he can’t settle down. Wide awake, the moonlight limning the curtains, he tugs the comforter tighter around his body, blinking at the ceiling and turning to stare at the cabin door. Erica is breathing steadily the next bed over, nothing but a knot of blonde hair peeking out from under the coverlet.

It’s not until just shy of midnight that the restlessness shifts into something else — buzzing under Stiles’s skin, sparking in his mind, tugging him upright and alert. He blinks and he’s at the door, feet shoved into his boots, pulling his coat on over his pajamas, distracted, and he steps out into the night.

The meadow is empty, even the stragglers gone to bed, or gathered around the fires in the hall, he guesses, glancing over at the faint sound of laughter, can see shadows gathered on the couches and heads bent close. He doesn’t care — he’s pulled away by the feeling that dragged him from his bed in the first place. He knows, bone-deep, that what he’s looking for isn’t in the hall.

The wolves are out running tonight, except one: Stiles barely see him, but the thrumming at the base of his skull tells him it’s Derek, hovering at the edge of the forest, and waiting for him.

++

Stiles gently rests a palm flat against the pile of logs, focuses on the rough bark on the tips of his fingers. He thinks about warmth and light, a welcoming hearth. He exhales a slow breath in a cloud of frost, and when he opens his eyes, a crackling campfire leaps to life. Stiles takes a step back, shaking out his wrists.

“Thank you,” Stiles says to the fire, rolling his shoulders, stretching his neck. He realizes, coming back to himself, that Derek’s never seen him do this before. He chances a glance over his shoulder.

Derek’s not looking at the fire at all. He’s focused on Stiles alone, gaze surprisingly soft, awed. “Stiles,” he says finally, “that was…”

Stiles laughs uncomfortably. “Ha ha, yeah. A fun trick, huh?”

“No,” Derek insists. “No. That was amazing. You’re… I’ve seen magic before. But I’ve never seen anything like that. You didn’t have to do anything, you just — How did you learn to do that?”

“A little bit of inheritance, a little bit of luck, a little bit of necessity… It’s kind of a long story,” Stiles hedges, rubbing at the back of his neck. He’s so sick of blushing every time he talks to Derek Hale - it’s fucking embarrassing. He seriously can’t wait for this stupid gathering to be over.

“I’ve got time,” Derek says, the barest hint of a smile on his lips — more like a quirk, Stiles thinks. Not quite a smile.

“Well,” Stiles huffs out breath. “When we were in high school a few years back, my best friend was bitten. It was a rogue alpha, and the local hunters were kind of useless and more trouble than they were worth, so we had to handle everything ourselves. It was a complete and total disaster at the time, but at least we all survived.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah. Crazy, right? Then, after that, it turned out that the alpha had bitten someone else, too, but he had turned into a kanima. So the laughs never stopped. At least that time the local emissary decided to help us. I was supposed to trap the kanima with a ring of mountain ash all the way around an old warehouse. But he didn’t give me enough. I still had twenty feet left to go, too. So I closed my eyes and imagined that there would be enough, that I could keep everyone safe, just this once.

“And it worked. When I opened my eyes, the circle was complete. I shouldn’t have been able to — I didn’t have any training, and there really, really wasn’t enough. But it worked,” Stiles says. “And we lived.”

“That’s incredible,” Derek says, staring at him, and Stiles feels a tingling sensation shoot from his shoulder to his fingertips. “Usually magic doesn’t just manifest on its own like that.”

“Turns out my mom might have known a thing or two about this,” Stiles admits. “When she was still alive. But I’ll never be sure. After that happened, though, I started working at it, trying to be useful. Pull my weight a little.”

“So you’re in a pack?” Derek asks.

“Kind of. My best friend Scott is alpha of the pack. I hang around with them a lot, but they already have an emissary, so.” Stiles shrugs. “I’m sort of the spare.”

“But you’re so powerful,” Derek says abruptly, sincerely. “You should be a second, at least, if not an emissary.”

“Yeah, well,” Stiles says, flushing. “Thanks, I guess. I’m still learning how to control it.” He clears his throat, desperate to change the subject. “You’re from Beacon Hills, right? Cora said.”

“Yeah.” Derek’s expression darkens. “And I’m never going back.”

“Well, big guy, I can’t say I blame you.” Stiles adjusts his jacket, tugging the collar up. The humming feeling still hasn’t gone away. “You’ve got plenty of reasons to stay away.”

Derek looks at him. “You know what they are?”

“Some of them,” Stiles admits, grimacing uncomfortably. “I’m the Sheriff's kid. I know a little more than I should about a lot of things. But I know enough to know that what happened to your family probably wasn’t an accident.”

“It wasn’t,” Derek says, voice gone cold. “I trusted the wrong person. I was young and inexperienced and lonely, and she took advantage of all of those things to manipulate me and murder my family.” He looks away, into the fire. “She’s dead now. My older sister, my uncle, Cora and I went to live with family in New York. A couple years ago, she tried to come out there and finish what she started. She was unsuccessful.”

Stiles watches him in profile. “I understand. I’d kill anyone who even came close to hurting my dad. He’s all I’ve got.”

“She’s one of the reasons I’m here now,” Derek says, picking up a twig and tossing it in the fire. “I need to know I’m with the right person. Someone I can trust.” They sit together in silence for a long moment, listening to the hissing and spitting fire. 

“I think I might be able to trust you,” Derek says finally, and stands, offering his hand. Stiles slides his fingers along Derek’s palm, grasping his open hand, and as he does, the low buzzing crawling under Stiles’s skin the entire night erupts.

“Do you feel that?” Stiles whispers, because he can’t feel anything else. It’s like there’s a swarm of wasps trapped between his radius and ulna, an electric current lighting up his bones, a resonant note vibrating through every muscle and tendon holding him together.

Derek inhales sharply, leaning closer. “I feel you,” he says, and when he kisses Stiles, when their lips finally touch, Stiles gasps, because all of it stops.

Everything is still and silent, except for the slow drag of Derek’s mouth on his, the soft sigh of his breath against Stiles’s cheek. His hand slides up Derek’s arm to weave his fingers through Derek’s hair, palm the nape of his neck. Derek slips an arm around his waist, pulling him close.

“Derek,” he gasps out, pulling back for air, “I want—”

“Yes,” Derek nods too quickly, “yes, anything.” And Stiles shuts him up with his mouth, shoves his hands under Derek’s shirt, fingers skating over muscle and skin.

“Fuck,” Stiles says. “Fuck, you’re so…” He trails off with a groan as Derek kisses down his neck, bites where it meets his shoulder, pushes his jacket off.

“You too,” Derek mumbles against his skin. Stiles runs his fingers along the waistband of Derek’s jeans. “You’re perfect.”

Stiles hisses out a breath as Derek pushes him back, pins him against a tree trunk, fitting their bodies together. He bends to kiss Stiles’s throat, scraping with his teeth. Stiles tugs Derek back up to kiss feels so good — Derek pressed up against him, warm and wanting, his hands roaming over Derek’s body, kissing deep and desperate. Stiles dips his hand down the back of Derek’s’ pants, grabbing handfuls of his ass, and Derek shudders against him.

“Is that okay?” he asks roughly, panting a little. Derek’s slightly breathless, too, his eyes half closed.

“Yes,” Derek says, “it’s okay,” and he grabs Stiles’s wrist, moving his hand to press up against the hard, thick line of his dick, clearly visible through his tight jeans.

“Oh my god,” Stiles manages. He scrambles to open Derek’s fly, shoves his own pajamas down to his thighs. “Yeah, come on—”

He groans when their skin touches, hips rolling against Derek’s, his dick bumping against Derek’s hip. Derek groans into Stiles’s shoulder. “Stiles. You smell so good.”

“You too,” Stiles says, like an idiot, but he can barely focus on anything other than the feeling of Derek’s dick touching his, trying to get a hand around them both, trying to keep his eyes open so he can watch. He spits into his palm and slicks his hand over the head of Derek’s dick, hot and smooth, and it’s that much better — the friction turned to a smooth glide as they find a rhythm together. Derek’s got one hand tangled with Stiles’s, wrapped around them, and one cradling the nape of his neck. He drags Stiles into a deep, filthy kiss and pulls back, resting his forehead against Stiles’s, watching their bodies move together, their hands, their dicks, and Stiles is — overwhelmed, feels so fucking good, is not going to last.

“Stiles,” Derek gasps again, and he’s coming all over both of them, hips jerking as he thrusts hard between them, and Stiles is following right after, crying out against Derek’s neck. There’s come all over his hand and his shirt but he doesn’t care, catching his breath while Derek leans against him, warm and sweaty and perfect.

“Now what?” Stiles murmurs after a while. Derek pulls away slightly, frowning.

“That depends,” Derek says slowly. “On what you want. There isn’t exactly a direct flight between Beacon Hills and Cold Spring. You have your pack, and I…” Derek trails off, sighing. “Mates are more important for werewolves than humans, even humans in packs. I can manage.”

“Do you… Is this not something you want? To manage,” Stiles asks. He doesn’t know Derek well enough to read him — yet, he tells himself, clinging to hope — but he seems reluctant. Resigned.

“I want to be with you,” Derek says quietly, gently squeezing Stiles’s shoulders. “But I don’t know how that works.”

“Me, too. I want that, too.” Stiles says hurriedly, but Derek just looks at him. He has to convince Derek he’s serious about this, but he doesn’t know how. “Wait… Wait. Just,” he grabs his coat off the ground, shaking off pine needles and shoving his arms in the sleeves as he turns. “Stay here.”

“Stiles, what —?” Derek starts to ask, but Stiles is already taking off back the way they came.

“Just, trust me! Stay there. I’ll be right back,” he shouts over his shoulder. It only takes him a few minutes to run out to the rock outcropping where they stood the day before.

He crouches next to a dense, thorny plum thicket. It’s an old one, he thinks, reaching up to trace a finger along one of its branches. It’s dormant, hibernating for the winter, exhausted and satisfied from a long summer and fall of flowering and bearing fruit.

“Hey there,” Stiles says. “You’ve earned your rest — your flowers this year were so beautiful and your plums were so delicious and perfect and juicy. I know you’ve got a long winter ahead and you need to save your strength,” he touches the end of a twig, the tip of the tree’s newest growth. “But I need to ask a favor.”

He walks back to the clearing carefully a few minutes later, and finds Derek sitting by the fire again, waiting for him. He walks past the fire and straight to stand in front of Derek, who’s looking up at him with wide eyes.

“Hi,” he says. “I don’t know if I’m doing this right, and I might be making a lot of assumptions here, but. Derek Hale, I ask you to allow me the gift of your time and courtship.” Stiles drops to one knee, and offers up his own gift: a crown of spiny branches, woven together in a single circle, laden with buds and the smallest most fragrant plum blossoms, a riot of bright yellow stamens at the center of each.

The moment’s stretching on a little too long, and Derek’s just looking at him, in that way he has — unreadable and far too intense. Stiles is starting to sweat a little — he can feel it cropping up under the collar of his coat — which suddenly seems like a stupid choice, his back so close to the fire, far too hot.

“Thank you,” Derek finally says, quiet and solemn, his fingers tangling with Stiles’s where he grips the crown. “I accept.”

Stiles watches, stunned into silence, as Derek rests the crown on his brow. It should look ridiculous on him, but it’s not — it’s perfect. Derek looks like a beautiful and wild thing, flushed from the heat of the flames, like a wolf on Beltane, eyes full of the fire of new life. Something deep in Stiles’s chest twists at the thought, a single word rising up in his throat as he desperately tries to swallow it down: _Mine._

“Good,” Stiles says instead. “That’s good.” He grins, backing up a few steps and dusting his hands off on his thighs. 

“Yeah,” Derek says, smiling back. “It is.”

**Author's Note:**

> My sincerest apologies to anyone who is from Colorado or knows anything at all about it. I am not, and don't, and it shows.
> 
> Title is from love to love u by Wrabel, which otherwise has nothing to do with this fic.
> 
> Thanks for reading! You can also find me on [tumblr](https://whateverrrrwhatever.tumblr.com/) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/whateverrrrisay).


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